


can you stake my heart

by ThunderstormsandMemories



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Homoerotic Blood Drinking, M/M, Vampires, love at first sword fight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2020-10-26
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:07:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27203587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThunderstormsandMemories/pseuds/ThunderstormsandMemories
Summary: Akira breaks into a castle, hoping for a chance to free the land from the tyrannical Vampire Lord Shido. He finds Goro instead.OR,His hand wavered, and he wished someone else were here to tell him what to do, and then a cold hand grasped his wrist and the vampire’s eyes snapped open. “What are you waiting for?” he snarled, baring his fangs, and his eyes flashed a bright, brilliant red.“Um,” said Akira eloquently. “Good morning?”
Relationships: Akechi Goro/Kurusu Akira, Akechi Goro/Persona 5 Protagonist
Comments: 10
Kudos: 168





	can you stake my heart

**Author's Note:**

> written for Shuakeshu Vampire Week 2020 (day 1: first meeting)

Sneaking into castles in broad daylight still made Akira uncomfortable. Breaking and entering was a night time activity, and as much as he enjoyed being a folk hero, a symbol of resistance against their evil vampiric overlord, he missed doing a little bit of good old fashioned burglary. All of the Phantom Thieves did, but they’d already been known for only targeting people who could afford it and giving away anything they didn’t need to people who did, so it made sense that they were the ones people turned to now. Still. Scaling the outer wall with sunlight beating down on him was unpleasant, and he could have dressed differently for this mission, sure, but he was attached to his all-black ensemble. It made him look dashing, no matter what Morgana thought, but he wasn’t about to take fashion advice from a talking cat who walked around mostly naked because, once again, Akira really could not stress this enough, he was a talking cat.

This particular castle was smaller than some of the others he’d broken into, one of the less impressive of the properties belonging to the Vampire Lord Shido, but size wasn’t everything, and Futaba had recorded strange readings around this place in recent weeks _—_ higher than usual amounts of hauntings and monster sightings and mysterious illnesses with similar symptoms to blood loss _—_ making it a likely candidate for the Vampire Lord’s hiding place. He hadn’t been seen in months, not that he ever really deigned to show his face amongst his mortal subjects, except to feed on them. Most mortals who entered into his court never returned. But there had been rumors _—_ quickly quashed, but not before they were reported to the Phantom Thieves _—_ that there had been infighting in his court, that he’d been injured, that this could be their chance to kill him, now, while he weakened, before he could return to his usual tyrannous ways.

Yusuke would’ve stopped to sketch the ornate decorations, complicated architectural flourishes that Akira didn’t know the names for. Yusuke would know, and would probably treat Akira to a lecture on their aesthetic value, but Akira mostly cared that they provided handholds for him as he made his way to the top of the keep. It was a little strange that there weren’t any guards, even though it was midday. Vampiric guards would be asleep inside, but Shido employed plenty of mortals desperate or foolish or ambitious enough to take his money.

Still, no one attacked him and no one raised an alarm, and he was able to slip in the window of what he assumed was the vampire’s bedroom without too much difficulty. He wished some of the other Thieves were there, so that someone could see how cool he looked when he used his grappling hook for the final part of the climb.

The room was sparser than he expected, for the hiding place of someone known for his opulence, with the only personal touch a pair of swords resting on the table near the bed. There was someone laying on the bed, and it was the middle of the day and the Vampire Lord was meant to be injured but Akira still held his breath as he crept closer. The approach had gone too smoothly, and as excited as he was to end the Vampire Lord’s reign, he couldn’t help but feel uneasy, that there had to be some sort of catch.

The catch, Akira realized as he stood over the unconscious body on the bed, knife poised and ready to plunge into the vampire’s heart, was that this wasn’t the Vampire Lord Shido. He wasn’t bald, for one thing, with soft brown hair that came to below his shoulders, and he was younger, at least in appearance. It was hard to tell actual age with vampires. Two of Akira’s strongest allies were vampires, twin girls who looked like children but even he had no idea how ancient Caroline and Justine actually were. Akira assumed this man, this unfortunately beautiful man, was one of the Vampire Lord’s followers, maybe someone who had been injured in the attempt on his life, maybe someone sent here to serve as a decoy while Shido himself hid elsewhere. And looking down on him, Akira found himself frozen in place, wrestling with indecision. This man wasn’t his target, and Akira really really didn’t like to kill unless he had to. He was a thief, not a hunter, and vampires were no less human than the mortals so many of them fed on. So maybe he could sneak away, before the man woke up, and he could return to the Thieves and tell them that they needed another plan. But if this was someone loyal enough to the Vampire Lord to act as bait on his behalf, surely he was complicit in the Vampire Lord’s crimes, and the world would be a better place without him in it.

His hand wavered, and he wished Morgana or Makoto or Futaba were here to tell him what to do, and then a cold hand grasped his wrist and the vampire’s eyes snapped open. “What are you waiting for?” he snarled, baring his fangs, and his eyes flashed a bright, brilliant red.

“Um,” said Akira eloquently. “Good morning?”

The vampire rolled his eyes at that, which was fair, and shoved Akira backwards, rolling off the bed and grabbing his swords in one fluid motion. Akira was impressed, and then mad at himself for being impressed, and then fighting for his life and couldn’t afford to take time admiring his adversary. He was a very good swordsman, which Akira thought was a bit unfair, considering he already had the physical advantage of being a vampire, and also a bit unusual, since most vampires thought they were too good, too proud and self-sufficient, to use weapons. They tended to rely on their own strength and speed, and their abilities to charm mortals into doing their bidding, and their teeth. But this one handled his swords like a professional, and though Akira was holding his own, he was breathing heavily and struggling to avoid being hit. Which, not to be too arrogant, was fairly unusual for him.

And then Akira let the vampire see that he was tiring, exaggerated his fatigue so that the vampire would underestimate him, and he fell for it, letting down his guard just enough for Akira to get in close and disarm him of both of his swords with a flourishing move that was only a little bit showing off. He was gratified to see a flicker of respect in the vampire’s face, and then he snarled again and lunged at Akira, knocking him off his feet and pinning him to the ground, crouched over him with one knee between Akira’s thighs, one hand gripping one of Akira’s wrist: the wrist that was, unfortunately, attached to the hand that was holding his knife, rendering it useless.

With his other hand, the vampire gripped Akira’s hair and tipped his head back, and part of Akira’s brain was aware that he was in danger, but part of his brain was rather preoccupied by the fact that a hot man was on top of him and pulling his hair. His heart was beating frantically in his chest, and if anyone asked he would’ve sworn it was because he was afraid. He wasn’t afraid.

“What a shame,” the vampire said, and his fangs gleamed as he lowered his mouth to Akira’s exposed throat. “I expected more from you.”

“Oh, really?” said Akira. “Sounds like a personal problem.” And then, with his free hand, he produced another blade from his sleeve and pressed the tip of it to the vampire’s chest, directly over his heart.

The vampire smiled at that, but with his fangs still protruding the expression looked distinctly feral and hungry. “We appear to be at an impasse. I doubt you can move quickly enough to stab me before I tear your throat out, and I admit that-” he grimaced, as if admitting any weakness physically pained him, “-I wouldn’t be fast enough to kill you without getting killed in the process. So what will you do?”

Akira wished he hadn’t insisted on coming alone. His reasons had made sense at the time _—_ it was easier for him to move silently by himself, even all of them together couldn’t defeat Shido in open combat so stealth was the only option, he couldn’t ask any of them to take the risk instead of him _—_ but now he desperately wished he’d let Ryuji back him up. “I’m here to defeat the Vampire Lord,” said Akira, seeing no advantage to lying and hoping that the truth might buy him enough time to think of a way out. “If you were him, I would stake you right now.”

“Even at the cost of your own life?” said the vampire, with a strange note in his voice that Akira couldn’t quite interpret. “What, are you one of those bleeding heart revolutionaries?”

“Something like that,” said Akira, grinning up at him. “I’m the leader of the Phantom Thieves, you might have heard of us?”

“Ugh,” the vampire said. “Of course. You have no idea how many problems you’ve caused for me personally.”

“That was kind of the point, yeah,” said Akira. “Causing problems on purpose for the Vampire Lord and all his minions.”

“Okay,” said the vampire, sitting back, releasing Akira’s head but not his wrist. “You’ve convinced me. You’re good enough.” His lips twisted smugly, like he was daring Akira to ask,  _ good enough for what? _

“Good enough for what?” Akira said, even though he knew that was what the vampire wanted from him, because he couldn’t help himself.

“To help me kill my father,” said the vampire grandly. He certainly had a taste for the dramatic, Akira thought. Well, in his defense, so did Akira. Maybe they would get along fairly well after all.

“Your- oh, you mean the Vampire Lord?” said Akira, and the vampire nodded. “Wait, you mean like  _ father  _ father, or like vampiric sire?”

He smiled thinly instead of answering and started to stand but doubled over again, clutching his side, and Akira saw dark, dead blood oozing out between his fingers and soaking the fine fabric of his clothing.

“Wait,” said Akira. “Shit, did I actually stab you? I didn’t think I-”

“It wasn’t you,” he said, sinking back down to his knees and opening up his shirt to check the bandages beneath. “It’s an older wound, but the fight with you must’ve reopened it. I assume you heard that there was an attempt on his life?”

“Yeah,” Akira said. “That’s why I’m here. We thought he was hiding out here because he was injured.”

“That’s not a bad guess,” said the vampire. “I figured he was less likely to look for me in one of his own castles. He’s arrogant like that.”

“Are you...okay?”

The vampire prodded at his wound and winced. “I’ll live. Or I won’t, technically, since I’m already dead. But no, this won’t stop me from achieving my goal.”

“You need blood, right?” said Akira, who knew enough about vampiric healing to know that if the wounds hadn’t knitted themselves closed by now on their own they weren’t going to, not without more fresh blood to replace what he had lost, and also that if this vampire had gone into hibernation to try to stop the blood loss soon after fleeing the Vampire Lord’s court, he had to be pretty damn hungry by now.

“Yeah, no shit,” said the vampire, and Akira waited for him to ask to drink his blood, but instead he just stared at him, as if to say,  _ and what are you gonna do about it? _ Because this vampire was incredibly proud and stubborn, so much so that Akira had picked up on it within five minutes of knowing him, and he was going to sit here and bleed out instead of asking Akira for help.

“You can take some of mine,” said Akira.

The vampire, instead of looking grateful, looked at Akira as if he had never seen him before. “You’re going to volunteer just like that? To someone you just met whom you have no reason to trust? How have you stayed alive so long?”

Akira treated him to his most charming smile. “By refusing to die, mostly. And by having some very cool friends.” And then, more seriously: “But I mean it. You need blood, and I’m offering.” He shrugged. “I’ve done it before, I have a friend who comes to me when she gets… thirsty.”

He raised an eyebrow. “A friend, huh?”

“Well,” Akira said, thinking about how Sumi used to blush and stammer whenever she asked him if she could drink from him, “I think she used to have a bit of a crush on me, yeah. But more importantly, I care about her and want her to be healthy, and she trusts me not to let her take too much.”

“I see,” said the vampire. “Well, if you’re sure.” Akira moved closer to him, pulling his collar down to give him easier access to his neck. Sumi usually found it easier to sit behind him so that she could lean against his back while she drank, or maybe she just didn’t want him to see her blushing, but with this stranger, even though Akira was willing to trust him, he preferred to have his hands, and his hidden blades, between them. Just in case.

He leaned closer, concentrating far too intently for something that really wasn’t that complicated, until Akira said, “Wait,” and he said back up immediately, watching Akira warily. “I don’t do this kind of thing anonymously.”

“Of course,” the vampire said dryly. “Where are my manners. My name is Goro Akechi.”

“Akira Kurusu,” he said, smiling brightly. Goro’s smile was smaller, almost sheepish, but it was there, and it did things to Akira’s heartbeat that he really hoped Goro’s vampiric blood senses didn’t pick up on. “There, now we’re friends.”

“Friends, huh,” said Goro again. “Sure. What’s a little bit of blood drinking between friends?”

“Exactly,” said Akira, and then he reached out and ran his fingers through Goro’s hair, which was just as soft and lovely as it looked, his hand coming to rest at the base of his skull, and he gently guided his head toward his throat. When Goro’s mouth first touched his neck it felt like a kiss. It still felt like a kiss as his fangs brushed his skin and even as he first bit in. And then he began to drink, and it felt better than any kiss Akira had ever had. The hand that was tangled in Goro’s hair flexed almost involuntarily, pulling his hair, but Goro didn’t seem to mind so Akira didn’t stop, and he let his head fall back as Goro drank deeply, his hands on Akira’s shoulders the only thing keeping Akira sitting vaguely upright.

Far too soon, Goro pulled away, detaching his teeth from Akira’s neck, still gripping Akira’s shoulders, which he was grateful for, and Akira couldn’t tear his eyes away from Goro’s lip, stained red with his blood. “That’s enough for now, I think.”

“For now?” said Akira, and he meant it to sound flirty but mostly it came across as eager, if Goro’s answering smirk was anything to go by.

“We do have a mission,” Goro reminded him. “I know where the Vampire Lord is, and I’m sure your friends will want to know you’re alive before we go after him.”

“My friends can help,” he said, and then added, perhaps a little optimistically, “I think you’ll like them.”

“Well, if they’re anything like you…” he said, letting his voice trail off as he stood, much more smoothly this time, offering Akira his hand to help him up, and Akira reached up and took it.

**Author's Note:**

> title from Vampires Will Never Hurt You by MCR
> 
> it's been a while since I just. sat down and typed out an entire fic in one day but here we are. I did a bunch of research for this that I ended up not using because it's a remix of that scene from the end of Castlevania season 1 so I didn't actually need a lot of specific historical details
> 
> come say hi on [twitter](https://twitter.com/selkie_au_lover)


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